The most helpful favorable review

The most helpful critical review

110 of 115 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 starsEveryone should read at least one of Frankl's books
This book and Frankl's other popular book, "Man's search for meaning" offer a great deal of overlap. Yet I fond both extrememlty interesting and helpful. Frankl posits that we all have an innate tendency to mental/spiritual health which he calls the will to meaning. This is similar to the body's hedency to heal after any physical assault. He explains that...

1.0 out of 5 starsNeed a degree to read!
Maybe it's my mistake but this book is very "complicated". I read Man's Search for Meaning and understood it but this one is full of medical terms. Was going to return it but postage was almost as much as purchase price.

This review is from: The Will to Meaning: Foundations and Applications of Logotherapy (Meridian S) (Paperback)

This book and Frankl's other popular book, "Man's search for meaning" offer a great deal of overlap. Yet I fond both extrememlty interesting and helpful. Frankl posits that we all have an innate tendency to mental/spiritual health which he calls the will to meaning. This is similar to the body's hedency to heal after any physical assault. He explains that good counselling focusses the will to meaning, or removes blocks which are preventing it from being expressed. Frankl's experiences in a NAZI death camp show how focussing on personal meaning and what little freedom of choice one does have, can enable mental health to survive even under the most pathogenic of circumstances.

This review is from: The Will to Meaning: Foundations and Applications of Logotherapy (Meridian S) (Paperback)

As several other reviewer have already mentioned, "The Will To Meaning" is basically an elaboration on the section from "Man's Search For Meaning" called "Logotherapy In A Nutshell." If "Man's Search For Meaning" made any sort of impact on you, I would highly suggest reading this book.

It is always great pleasure to read Dr. Frankl's books. This was no exception. Although the Book was written many years ago, it contains many practical principles that can be used to overcome "existential vacuum", which is so rampant today. Must read book for those feeling aimless in this fragmented society.

This review is from: The Will to Meaning: Foundations and Applications of Logotherapy (Meridian S) (Paperback)

Viktor Emil Frankl (1905-1997) was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist as well as a Holocaust survivor, as well as the founder of logotherapy, a form of existential psychotherapy. His most famous book (which also describes his experiences in the Holocaust) is Man's Search for Meaning.

He states in the Preface to this 1969 book, "This book is the outcome of a series of lectures I was invited to give during the 1966 summer session ... The particular task assigned to me at that time was to explain the system that characterizes logotherapy. While it has often been pointed out ... that logotherapy ... has developed a proper psycherapeutic technique ... it also is the last psychotherapy that is conceptualized in a systematic way."

Here are some representative quotations from the book:

"(L)ogotherapy is based on the following three concepts: (1) the freedom of the will; (2) the will to meaning; and (3) the meaning of life.""After all, it is not the function of logotherapy to give answers. Its actual function is that of a catalyst.""It is true that we logotherapists are convinced, and if need be, persuade our patients, that there is a meaning to fultill. But we do not pretend to know WHAT the meaning is.""I personally believe that philosophy is not a mere sublimation of sex but rather that sex often serves as a cheap escape from precisely those philosophical and existential problems which beset man.""What matters in life is rather to achieve something.""Logotherapy does not cross the boundary between psychotherapy and religion. But it leaves the door open to religion and it leaves it to the patient whether or not to pass the door.""I would say that God is not dead but silent. Silent, however, he has been all along. The 'living' God has been a 'hidden' God all along."

This review is from: The Will to Meaning: Foundations and Applications of Logotherapy (Meridian S) (Paperback)

When I found Victor Frankl it was a happy day. There is hope! As our nation slumps into relitavistism, can't help it - give me another med, what? get a job?, not my fault, mentality, with the media, including news, music, and literature helping along as they cash in on the descent of american society, step forward Frankl!! Victor Frankl is more than just logotherapy, he is David adroitly throwing stones at a huge medicated/miserable/morbid Goliath. Take responsiblity, our attitude is our one freedom, get over it and get on with it. I found his books 2 years ago and have read them over and over and over. Whether it be for your depressed teen, unhappy spouse, or for you because you just can't find purpose in the job you go to every day...read 'Man's search for meaning' and 'the will to meaning', then everything else the man has written. His own story is his best example.

This review is from: The Will to Meaning: Foundations and Applications of Logotherapy (Meridian S) (Paperback)

I'm told that the definition of a philosopher is simple: a meaning junky. Well...true. And meaning junkies everywhere must start somewhere. This book was a major start for me.

I read Will To Meaning back in college in the late 60s, early 70s and never forgot that work, ended up majoring in Philosophy and Theology. Plato said that all philosophy is preparation for death and most certainly it was in Hitler's death camps that this man found his gift and key thought...that one can endure anything if meaning can be found inside the pain.

I read this morning that Frankl said: "What is to give light must endure burning". This man burned with that which fuels all philosophers, namely the meaning of things. Indeed, the questions and all the leaning toward answers and all that we muse, the desire to know even what can't be known is what keeps us moving forward, keeps us and gets us home alive. That's what stuck from this book...45 years later.

Read this work. Few things written have legs and endure like this book has endured.

This review is from: The Will to Meaning: Foundations and Applications of Logotherapy (Meridian S) (Paperback)

Maybe it's my mistake but this book is very "complicated". I read Man's Search for Meaning and understood it but this one is full of medical terms. Was going to return it but postage was almost as much as purchase price.